How to Choose a PoE Switch for Your WISP Tower

At a tower site, the switch is the heart of the operation. It powers your radios, moves every subscriber's traffic, and often lives in a sealed enclosure that bakes in summer and freezes in winter. Pick the right one and you cut truck rolls for years. Here's the framework we use.

1. Size your power budget first

Add up the PoE draw of every device the switch will feed — radios, backhaul, a camera or two — then add 25–30% headroom for cold-weather startup surges and the radios you'll add next season. A Netonix WS-8-150 delivers 150W across eight ports; step up to the WS-12-250 or WS-26-400 as your site grows. Undersizing the power supply is the number-one cause of mystery reboots at the tower.

2. Match PoE voltage to your radios

WISP gear is a mix of 24V passive, 48V passive, and 802.3af/at. The Netonix WS series lets you set voltage per port from the web UI, so you can run a 24V dish on port 1 and a 48V sector on port 2 without adapters or guesswork. Getting this wrong can damage a radio — per-port control is worth every penny.

3. AC or DC input?

Grid-powered sites take an AC model. Solar and battery sites should run a DC-input switch like the WS-8-150-DC or WS-26-500-DC, which accepts your 48V plant directly and skips the inefficiency (and failure point) of an inverter.

4. Uplinks and backhaul

If your backhaul is fiber or a licensed link, you'll want SFP/SFP+ uplinks — the WS3-14-600 adds SFP+ for 10G. Copper-only sites can uplink on a standard gigabit port, but plan for the day you outgrow it.

5. Management, telemetry, and protection

The features that save truck rolls: remote per-port power cycling (reboot a frozen radio from your couch), live voltage and temperature readings, and built-in surge protection. Pair the switch with proper grounding and a surge suppressor on every line that leaves the enclosure.

Ready to spec a site? Browse our managed PoE switches — every listing shows live warehouse stock so you know what ships today.